THE property leasing company built up by shamed Manchester businessman Shaid Luqman has gone into administration with debts of more than é100m, it emerged today.

Lexi Holdings was placed in the hands of KPMG after being called in by the company's bankers. Sixteen staff have been made redundant at the company, which traded from Manchester and London.

A statement from leading accountancy firm KPMG said: "Richard Fleming and Brian Green from KPMG Restructuring have been appointed joint administrators to Lexi Holdings PLC, the property financing firm operated by entrepreneur Shaid Luqman.

"Lexi Holdings, which employs 16 people across its offices in Manchester and Mayfair, provides a comprehensive range of property finance services across the UK, Ireland and within Europe. The firm has an annual turnover of approximately é30m."

Joint administrator Richard Fleming said: "We will be reviewing the company position over the next few days and actively seeking to recover the existing loan portfolio."

Banned

The demise of Lexi Holdings comes less than two weeks after Mr Luqman was banned from acting as a company director, for the maximum term of 15 years, in relation to his conduct as a director of another failed Manchester company, Modern Living UK Ltd.

In court on October 4, Mr Luqman, 37, of Hale, was branded "completely dishonest" by Mr Justice Patten, Vice Chancellor of the County Palatine of Lancaster, over the failure of Modern Living UK.

According to the most recent Sunday Times Rich List, Mr Luqman has a personal fortune of around é250m, placing him joint 238th on the list of the country's richest people.

He is a former national Young Entrepreneur of the Year. Mr Luqman was not available for comment. But he has hired publicists Max Clifford Associates, who claimed that Mr Luqman had made é245m from the sale of the European division of Lexi Holdings this month to "a Middle Eastern Bank", which it declined to name.

A spokeswoman for Mr Luqman said the company, which was now in administration, had not been trading for the past two years and had been "run down".